Automattic

Automattic Inc. is an American global distributed company which was founded in August 2005 and is most notable for WordPress.com (a freemium blogging service), as well as its contributions to WordPress (an open source blogging software). The company's name is a play on founder Matt Mullenweg's first name and automatic.

Not to be confused with Automatic.
Automattic Inc.
TypePrivate
Industry
  • Internet
  • Web Development
  • Software
FoundedAugust 2005, United States
FounderMatt Mullenweg
HeadquartersSan Francisco, California
Key people
Matt Mullenweg (Founder, CEO, president)
Brands
Number of employees
2,002 (Mar 2023)[1]
Websiteautomattic.com

Automattic raised US$846 million in six funding rounds.[2] The last round of US$288 million was closed in February 2021. A subsequent private stock buyback valued the company at US$7.5 billion.[3]

The company had 2,002 employees as of March 2022.[4] Its remote working culture was the topic of a participative journalism project by Scott Berkun, resulting in the 2013 book The Year Without Pants: WordPress.com and the Future of Work.[5]

History

On January 11, 2006, it was announced that Toni Schneider would be leaving Yahoo! to become CEO of Automattic. He was previously CEO of Oddpost before it was acquired by Yahoo!, where he had continued as a senior executive.[6][7]

In April 2006 Automattic's Regulation D filing showed it had raised approximately $1.1 million in funding,[8] which Mullenweg addressed in his blog. Investors were Polaris Ventures, True Ventures, Radar Partners.

On 18 October 2007, Automattic acquired Gravatar.[9]

On September 23, 2008, Automattic announced acquiring IntenseDebate.[10] Two months later, on November 15, 2008, Automattic acquired PollDaddy.[11]

The former office of Automattic at 140 Hawthorne Street in San Francisco (in July 2017, since closed)

On September 9, 2010, Automattic gave the WordPress trademark and control over bbPress and BuddyPress to the WordPress Foundation.[12]

On April 4, 2014, Automattic acquired Longreads.[13]

On May 19, 2015, Automattic announced the acquisition of WooThemes, including their flagship product WooCommerce.[14]

On November 21, 2016, Automattic, via a subsidiary company (Knock Knock, WHOIS There) managed the launch and later development of the .blog gTLD, becoming domain registrars.[15]

In 2017, Automattic announced that it would close its San Francisco office, which had served as an optional co-working space for its employees alongside similar spaces near Portland, Maine and in Cape Town, South Africa.[16]

On June 21, 2018, Automattic acquired Atavist and its magazine.[17]

On May 21, 2019, Automattic acquired Prospress,[18] which provided a number of popular WooCommerce extensions and tools.[19]

On August 12, 2019, Automattic acquired Tumblr from Verizon Media.[20]

On August 16, 2019, Automattic acquired Zero BS CRM[21] and rebranded it a year later to Jetpack CRM.[22]

On September 19, 2019, Automattic announced a Series D funding round of $300 million from Salesforce, bringing the post-money valuation of the company to $3 billion.[23]

On February 8, 2021, Automattic acquired content analytics platform parse.ly for WPVIP, Founder Matt Mullenweg announced on his blog.[24]

On June 14, 2021, Automattic acquired journaling app Day One.[25]

On July 16, 2021, Automattic acquired the podcasts app Pocket Casts.[26]

On October 24, 2023, Automattic acquired Texts.com, a universal messaging app, for $50 million.[27]

Projects

Other projects include:

  • After the Deadline[28] – online proofreading tool now built into WordPress.com and Jetpack[29]
  • Atavist – multimedia publishing platform
  • Akismet – anti-comment spam system capable of integration with many blogging platforms and forums
  • bbPress[30] – forum software
  • blo.gs[31] – RSS feed aggregator
  • BuddyPress – social networking plugin suite
  • Cloudup[32] – file sharing application
  • Crowdsignal[33] (formerly Polldaddy) – polls and survey tools
  • GlotPress[34] – collaborative translation tool
  • Gravatar – globally recognized avatars
  • HappyTools[35] - resource planning software
  • IntenseDebate[36] – blog comment hosting service that was launched as a private beta in January 2007 by Co-Founders Jon Fox, Isaac Keyet, and Josh Morgan,[37] and launched as an open beta on October 30, 2007. On September 23, 2008, Automattic announced its acquisition of IntenseDebate's properties,[38] and returned to private beta until November of that year. In 2007, IntenseDebate was selected to be part of the first class of Techstars, a Boulder, Colorado-based startup accelerator
  • Jetpack - WordPress plugin providing a range of basic services (backup, speed, stats, etc.)
  • Longreads[39] – original reporting and journalism aggregator[13]
  • Mongoose ODM[40] – mongodb object modeling for node.js
  • Pocket Casts[41] – app for listening to podcasts on iOS, Android, macOS, Windows and the web
  • Poster – blogging app for IOS[42]
  • Ping-O-Matic[43] – pinging service[44]
  • Simplenote – note-taking and sync service acquired by Automattic in 2013 and later open-sourced
  • Scroll Kit[45] – code-free web design tool[46]
  • Tumblr - Microblogging platform[47]
  • VaultPress[48] – backup and security service for WordPress sites
  • VideoPress[49] – hosted HD video for WordPress sites
  • WooCommerce – eCommerce plugin for WordPress with a marketplace for extensions
  • WPVIP[50] – Enterprise WordPress hosting, support, and consulting

References
  1. "About Us". Automattic. 2021-10-19. Retrieved 2021-10-19.
  2. "Automattic". theladders.com. Retrieved 19 November 2021.
  3. Matt Mullenweg (August 16, 2021). "Funding, Buyback, and Hiring".
  4. "About Us". Automattic. 2021-10-19. Retrieved 2021-10-19.
  5. Scott Berkun (10 September 2013). The Year Without Pants: WordPress.com and the Future of Work. Wiley. ISBN 978-1-118-66063-8.
  6. Malik, Om (11 January 2006). "Yahoo Exec Exits For Automattic CEO Gig". gigaom.com. Archived from the original on 20 September 2017. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  7. Moving On From Yahoo -> Automattic « Toni's Garage Archived November 14, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
  8. "EDGAR Search Results". www.sec.gov. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  9. "Automattic Acquires Gravatar". TechCrunch. 2007-10-18. Retrieved 2023-09-07.
  10. "Automattic Acquires IntenseDebate". 23 September 2008. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  11. "Automattic Acquires PollDaddy!". 15 October 2008. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  12. "A New Home for the WordPress Trademark". 9 September 2010. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  13. "Longreads Is Joining the Automattic Family". 9 April 2014. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  14. "WooThemes Joins Automattic". 19 May 2015. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  15. "About Knock Knock, WHOIS There". 13 April 2016. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  16. Staley, Oliver (2017-06-12). "Wordpress's owner is closing its San Francisco office because its employees never show up". Quartz. Retrieved 2019-10-20.
  17. "Automattic, Parent Company of WordPress.com, Acquires Atavist Publishing Platform and Award-Winning Magazine". PR Newswire. June 21, 2018. Retrieved June 22, 2018.
  18. Shepherd, Brent (May 22, 2019). "A Final Prospress Post…". Prospress Blog. Archived from the original on 2019-05-24. Retrieved September 22, 2021.
  19. Dillet, Romain (May 23, 2019). "Automattic acquires subscription payment company Prospress". TechCrunch. Retrieved September 22, 2021.
  20. Radulovic, Petrana (August 12, 2019). "Tumblr sold off yet again, adult content bans to be relaxed, but are being discussed". Polygon. Retrieved August 12, 2019.
  21. "Zero BS CRM acquired" (Press release). August 16, 2019.
  22. "Introducing Jetpack CRM: Grow Your Business Through Better Contact Management". Jetpack. Automattic. 2020-07-20. Archived from the original on 2020-07-21. Retrieved 2021-08-17.
  23. "Automattic raises $300 million at $3 billion valuation from Salesforce Ventures". TechCrunch. 19 September 2019. Retrieved 2020-04-23.
  24. "Parse.ly & Automattic". Matt Mullenweg. 2021-02-08. Retrieved 2021-02-09.
  25. "WordPress.com owner Automattic acquires journaling app Day One". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2021-06-14.
  26. "Popular Podcast App Pocket Casts Joins Automattic – WordPress.com News". 16 July 2021.
  27. Pierce, David (2023-10-24). "Automattic is acquiring Texts and betting big on the future of messaging". The Verge. Retrieved 2023-10-24.
  28. "After the Deadline - Spell, Style, and Grammar Checker for WordPress, Firefox, TinyMCE, jQuery, and CKEditor". afterthedeadline.com.
  29. "Looking for After the Deadline? It's in there!". 4 December 2012.
  30. "bbPress.org".
  31. "blo.gs". blo.gs.
  32. "Cloudup". cloudup.com.
  33. "Crowdsignal | Surveys, Polls, and Quizzes | Get the responses you need, anywhere". Crowdsignal.
  34. "GlotPress | Building the GlotPress Translation Manager". glotpress.blog.
  35. "Happy Tools — Tools for teams with work to do". Happy Tools.
  36. "IntenseDebate comments enhance and encourage conversation on your blog or website". www.intensedebate.com.
  37. "Intense Debate Soups Up Your Blog Comments". 7 August 2007. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  38. Fox, Jon (2008-09-23). "Automattic Acquires IntenseDebate". Archived from the original on 2021-08-17. Retrieved 2022-07-10.
  39. "Longreads : The best longform stories on the web". Longreads.
  40. "Mongoose ODM v5.9.10". mongoosejs.com.
  41. Budelli, Eli (16 July 2021). "Popular Podcast App Pocket Casts Joins Automattic". wordpress.com. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  42. "Automattic Acquires iOS WordPress Client Poster To Improve Its Own Mobile Apps". 17 June 2013.
  43. "Ping-o-Matic!". pingomatic.com.
  44. "What is Ping-O-Matic?". February 8, 2009.
  45. "scroll kit". www.scrollkit.com.
  46. "scroll kit". www.scrollkit.com. Retrieved 24 January 2018.
  47. "Automattic Acquires Tumblr, Plans to Rebuild the Backend Powered by WordPress". August 13, 2019.
  48. "VaultPress - WordPress Backup and Security". vaultpress.com.
  49. "VideoPress Plugin for WordPress". VideoPress Plugin for WordPress.
  50. "Enterprise WordPress hosting, support, and consulting - WordPress VIP". Enterprise WordPress hosting, support, and consulting - WordPress VIP.

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